


Persephone forgot to dream

by Just_Mad_Enough



Category: Lucifer (TV)
Genre: A lot of them - Freeform, F/M, Gen, I think God might be a fan of Drama, hell ain't nice, lucifer is confused, there's pomegranates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-22
Updated: 2018-08-22
Packaged: 2019-07-01 01:07:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,640
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15763482
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Just_Mad_Enough/pseuds/Just_Mad_Enough
Summary: Chloe hates him. Or she doesn't because she's dead. Or was that someone else entirely? He keeps on not remembering, even though he probably should. It might be important.





	Persephone forgot to dream

**Author's Note:**

> Soooo. This is gonna be a weird one. Just saying.  
> Also, thank you to FluffyGlitterPantsDragon for beta reading, and for making me WANT to write this.

He remembers still, how it had been right after The Fall. He’d been so, so tired. All the arguing and fighting – with words and fists and weapons, and all he wanted to do, once he’d dragged himself out of the crater he had created, was to sleep.

He had screamed until his vocal chords must’ve resembled his outer appearance; raw and shredded. If there had been any poetry left to him at that point, he might’ve added something along the lines of “raw and bleeding, like my heart. Torn to pieces by those who should’ve loved me with no conditions at all.”

But really, after screaming at his Father to  _ please, let me come home, please, I’ll never question you again, I just want to be back, pleasepleaseplease… _

The capacity to create pretty, if melancholy, words just wasn’t in him anymore.

So he’d dragged himself away, hid in a shallow cave and went to sleep, unafraid of the natives. Whatever would they be able to do to him that his own family hadn’t yet anyway?

 

He hadn’t known back then that the place was greedy for anything it could get; with his conscious mind shut away, it gnawed at the places that felt guilt for hurting his siblings, when they came for him and he had to defend himself. Hell sunk its hooks into every painful place and the nightmares he had while asleep never managed to find their equal in later times.  _ Thank fuck _ . He didn’t know – still doesn’t – how long he had spent in those nightmares. It could have been weeks, months or even years. That delirious time spent in the darkest nooks and crannies of his own mind where what gave him the idea for the Hell Loops, so he can’t see it was for nothing. Still, it was the first and the last time he went to sleep in Hell.

After he had cemented his place on top of the pecking order, he takes sojourns _upstairs_ , and he soon finds out that he has to sleep on earth. Something about the place makes him need it, which is inconvenient – as so much else about the human race is, really. He had made Mazikeen stand guard, just to make sure that his Kingdom couldn’t get to him up there.

It didn’t, so he relaxed; his visits got longer, and he slept. The places he stayed in always,  _ always _ had the most luxurious beds. After not sleeping for centuries at a time, it always came as the most sensuous relief to close his eyes and let himself drift off in peace.  _ To sleep, perchance to dream,  _ indeed.

And his stint into a Hell-Loop of his very own had been cut short when his Mother, for once, came to his rescue.

So it really didn’t come as a surprise when he forgot to remember that he died, and never even knew that he got stuck in one,  _ again _ .

+++ +++ +++

There are a great many things going through his head as he’s busy plucking the bullets out of his wings.

Things like  _ why the Me did I promise Dr. Linda not to cut those bloody things off again _ and  _ this would be easier with help. Like apes plucking lice out of their fur _ .

But mostly, it’s her name ricocheting around the inside of his skull.  _ ChloeChloeChloeChloe _ , never-ending, like a broken record.

He yet hears her scream, high pitched and desperate, the lack of air in her lungs making it thready if no less scared-sounding. And he sees her stumbling backward, sitting down on the ground, careless of the debris strewn about.

At first, he thinks it’s shock over seeing her ex-fiancées body. Then he looks around him, looking for some attacker he had missed, because the expression on her face is neither grief nor anger or even reprimand for what he did - it’s fear. But no one is attacking, and he’s confused - for a moment. Then he takes a step closer to her and lifts his hands, readying himself to pull her up and into his embrace. And then he stops, because while the view is familiar it’s no less unwanted. 

He had wished for it back, just not  _ now _ , not like this. He’d say beggars can’t be choosers, only he hadn’t begged for anything since his screams had fallen on deaf ears so many eons ago, and contrary to popular belief he’s very rarely the one _ allowed  _ the choices. So he stands there, Hellfire in his eyes and looking the charred remains of a man she once knew. There’s even a punchline.

He looks like The Devil again when, up there on the roof, he had felt like the Archangel Samael for the first time in so long, even he had trouble remembering what it had been like.

How To Break The Devil 101: go ahead and make him fall (hah!) in love. It’ll destroy him for sure.

He thinks this is why they call it  _ falling in love _ \- his siblings told humanity of the consequences his rebellion carried. He Fell and it as good as erased everything good he had ever done in  _ any _ one’s eyes. Love usually amounted to the same thing in his experience, only maybe on a slightly smaller scale.

What came next will never make him proud, but it’s something he’s gotten to be good at - he makes a run for it.

Their partnership (friendship… more?) is damaged beyond repair anyway, so he shakes out his wings, painful though it is, flaps them once and disappears. 

Lucifer knows he left her to pick up the pieces. To explain… everything. To Dan and Ella, and the authorities sure to arrive sooner or later.

He knows, and he cares. Better to make a clean break though. She can work herself into a lather, get angry and set aside the scared - angry suited her better by a landslide anyway. And then she would be able to hide in that anger, and she can hate him while he goes back… well, not home. That place of ashes and no honor had never been his home. It’s  _ his  _ though, for better or worse, and it’s as good a place for licking one’s wounds as any.

The last bullet clatters to the ground, the sound hollow and sad in the silent space that has turned his penthouse into a parody of its former liveliness.

_ This _ , he decides,  _ is  _ **_worse_ ** _ than Hell _ .

+++ +++ +++

He goes about the days following the shoot-out a bit like a zombie in one of those really horrid b-movies. At least that’s what it feels like to him. After his wings had healed – and after the eternity it had taken him to  _ clean _ the bloody things – and everyone had had time to cool down, he got dressed and ready.

He’d walked into the precinct, pretending it was just another Day At The Office. He doesn’t think anyone had noticed the slight shake of his hands, or that his smile looks a little off. People usually just see what they want to see, and  _ Lucifer Morningstar unsure of himself _ wasn’t one of those things.

So he walks in, saunters over to Chloe’s desk with coffee-like beverage in hand, and nearly stops dead in his tracks at the look of disgust on her face. He tries to say something,  _ anything _ , but no words come to mind.

He quickly turns on his heels, deposits the drink on some random officer’s desk and escapes the suffocating atmosphere.

The next time he’s aware of anything, he’s wandering around somewhere in the Devil’s Playground, with the sun glaring down, uncaring and unforgiving. But who can he blame but himself? – he created the blasted thing, after all.

He thinks he might’ve flown here, but he really can’t be sure. After wandering around for Dad only knows how long, he makes his way back to the penthouse. Once there, he tries to get his mind off of her, but nothing seems to do the trick. Alcohol is useless as always, when she’s not around. Music won’t come to him, his fingers hovering uselessly over the piano keys, and the television is only a suitable companion when he’s sleep deprived. But the thought of staying up for days on end, thinking, remembering, torturing himself… no. He’s not into the kind of self-flagellation that brings no pleasure in exchange for the pain. So he simply undresses and goes to sleep.

He has nightmares, of course; blasted things don’t seem to ever end, anymore. Awake or asleep, he always feels as though everything is surreal and dipped in venom.

Time flies or crawls by in unpredictable intervals. Maze had been by, looking much worse for wear, but holding herself proudly, as always. She comes to tell him that they’re even.

She tried to betray him, and she got her comeuppance for it. She’s done with him now – no more begging and (or) threatening him to take her home. Home is here, now, because she’s got nothing waiting for her in Hell. No family she’d care to see again, and the cries of the damned had lost their appeal a long time ago. No master she’d wish to see back on his throne. She walks out on him, and he knows he probably won’t ever see her again when she fails to turn around even once.

+++ +++ +++

He’s walking along the beach when he watches a lifeguard stumble to the beach, lifeless body in tow. The woman drops down next to the body and starts CPR. Some more of her ilk join in, but even from where he’s standing he knows it’s futile. He knows a dead body when he sees one. And no matter how many how people turn up dead on a beach or in an alley, the world always keeps on turning as though nothing had happened at all and… and he laughs. Loud and full-throated, and he’s aware he must sound insane, but really.

How could he have been so  _ stupid _ ? 

_ The world had kept on turning as though nothing had happened _ . Which just isn’t possible. It had all been fun and games while Pierce still had his mark. Then, he was immortal. But the moment the mark had gone beddy-bye had been the point where he should’ve stopped.

_ Thou shalt not kill _ .

And while humans, unruly creatures that they are, never once listened to that edict, his Father had made sure that all His children  _ had _ to follow it.

And yet, nothing had happened. He had killed Pierce – the one who was not supposed to stay dead  _ at all _ , least of all by celestial hand.  _ And nothing had happened _ .

There should’ve been lightening and thunder, locusts, rains of blood and frogs. 

He looks around him now and sees the place where some far-away beach houses waver, and he listens to the sound of the ocean, and he notices how it’s off,  _ just _ enough to be recognizable when you know what you’re looking for.

Those idiots had been firing at them out of automatic weapons. The Detective had been pressed so close to him that he had been able to feel her warmth. Over the pain of his wings being shot to pieces, he must’ve missed a bullet hitting something else. Something vital. And between then and carrying her to safety… yes. He can see it now. He must’ve died somewhere in there.

He just hopes it was  _ after _ he had carried her out.

Turning around now, he finds himself no longer on the beach, but surrounded by empty stone walls.

There’s a simple door without a lock, and he strides out of it, shakes his wings loose and aims for Earth.

+++ +++ +++

He wakes up with a shudder and a deep breath and looks around himself. He’s on the roof, where he remembers setting Chloe down.

He must’ve collapsed then, though he can’t remember the exact point where reality and Hell Loop had been exchanged for each other. It doesn’t matter anyway - he’s got more important things to do.

There’s a puddle of blood where he had been lying and his button down is ripped open. The pale jacket his Detective had been wearing had slid down when he sat up, but it’s blood-drenched as well. He knows she had used it to try and staunch the bleeding. 

He wished he could’ve spared her that. To watch her partner bleed out and die right under her hands. But there’s nothing for it now, so he gathers his wits about him, re-buttons his shirt and makes his back to where he’s come from.

+++ +++ +++

The room is silent as a grave. There’s no henchmen lingering anymore, and Pierce is nowhere to be found either. He’s left a present for the devil, though. The windows are whole - no enraged Devil to fly in and shatter them. instead, he had walked in through the door, hoping to catch anyone still there unawares.

She’s lying on the landing, right under the windows. The sunlight streaming in bathes her in light, and with her hair fanned out like that, it nearly looks like a halo. The only thing destroying the peaceful picture is the tiny, neat hole in the middle of her forehead. Some blood had trickled down the side of her face, but not so much as to make her seem gravely injured. He knows the back of her head would paint a different picture altogether, but he can’t bring himself to look. For that, he would have to get closer, and he finds himself rooted to the spot.

He’s still standing there when a SWAT team crashes in. They make him kneel on the ground, hands in the air.

Daniel had rushed by him at one point, closely followed by Ella. There’s screaming and cries of denial and grief.

_ He  _ just feels numb down to his core.

At one point he finds himself sitting in the passenger seat of a squad car, steaming cup of  _ something  _ in his hands and an emergency blanket wrapped around him. There’s a paramedic kneeling in front of him, shining a light into his eyes and telling a hovering Officer something about shock.

It’s gone past midnight when he makes it back to his penthouse. At one point, he had been able to tell them about the ambush. He had to twist his tale some, of course but not by much, really.

The henchmen had been firing around them in a circle. Trying to scare them. No, he doesn’t know anything about the feathers. Maybe some art installation? Yes, Pierce had shot Chloe. Once in the chest, hitting her vest. The other… well.

They let him go because it had taken them hours to make him make sense, and because there’s no gunpowder residue on his hands.

He stands in the shower, wings out and soaked through, and watches his blood turn pink and swirl down the drain and he thinks  _ I don’t know how it happened _ .

Had she seen Pierce aiming at her? Or had she walked down the stairs and had been surprised by it?  _ Was  _ it Pierce? He only knows there hadn’t been much of a fight - if any. No more shots had been fired from her own gun, and she hadn’t shown any signs of hand to hand. So pointless.

He shuts off the shower when the water runs clear once again, and drags himself to bed. His wings are hidden away again, and he knows he should do something about the bullets still lodged in there, but he’s so, so tired. So he sleeps.

He’s aware of people coming in, talking to -  _ at  _ \- him, and leaving again. At one point, Maze is there, and she tries to make him get up so he shakes out his wings and slams her across the room.

That’s as much energy as he can muster, so he drops back down and tries to go back to sleep. There’s pain, then. The physical kind. It’s Maze. She has her dagger out, and at first he thinks she’s trying to carve him up like a chicken, but… no. She’s plucking out bullets where he’s left them to fester.

He drifts back to sleep to the plink-ing sound of metal fragments landing on hardwood floor. 

+++ +++ +++ 

Pierce had gone to ground. Which is not surprising, and now he’s entirely frustrated with himself for missing… days, or weeks, he doesn’t know. He should’ve gone after the bastard right away, but instead he’d sunk into self-pity. Now the fool has a head start, and not even his connections brought up anything useful. 

He prays, at one point. First to Amenadiel, hoping that his brother yet remembers that they’ve been closer, recently. When no answer comes from that direction, he tries some of his other siblings; he goes so far as to pray to Michael directly, but of course he doesn’t answer, either. 

When he gives up on praying, he opens his eyes and finds himself standing in the desert. It strikes him as weird - he can’t remember going there, and this isn’t the first time he’s ended up there with no knowledge of  _ how _ .

He doesn’t want to fly - doesn’t want to use the wings that hadn’t been able to do him any good, after all, so he starts to walk.

The last thing he sees before he lets his mind stray again is the dried husk of a pomegranate.

+++ +++ +++

He finds out the truth like this: there’s pomegranates  _ everywhere _ . Seeds of them strewn on a salad he gets himself for lunch. Used as decoration on the Devil’s Food Cake he buys and sends to Beatrice.

A new painting in Dr. Linda’s office. He tries to read a book to get his mind off the empty stare of his Detective, to try and forget for a moment that she’s somewhere he can’t ever follow.

The book debates whether the apple was an  _ actual  _ apple. It might have been a tomato, because in some languages it’s also called  _ Paradisapfel _ . Or it might be a pomegranate, because the fruit seems to be too heavily featured in ancient books and stories to be unimportant. The book tries to be exceedingly funny by mentioning that _ well, it could’ve been a  _ cherry _ , eh?  _ That last bit manages to make him smile, just barely - figures that the bit in there that’s meant in jest is the only thing that’s spot on.

It turns into a cycle. He sleeps, and sometimes he has nightmares. He wakes up in the desert. He walks back. The world seems to turn greyer every day, the only spots of color the red of pomegranates.

+++ +++ +++

_ First, she had been angry. He’d called her, telling her he’d come even, tell her everything. She’d stayed awake forever, waiting for him to break into her home again. She’d dozed off at some point, waking up to the grey pre-dawn light just making it through the windows. _

_ She figured he wouldn’t come, went to bed and slept for a few more hours. _

_ Four days later, with no word from her partner and - way more important - no pictures or blurbs on any of his social media accounts, she set aside the angry and threw herself straight into worried. _

_ From there, it had been pretty easy to find him. _

_ His phone went straight to voicemail, no matter who tried to call him, so it was obviously dead. But she followed the GPS to the last place it had been giving off any signal, and she’s never been this glad that Dan could be overprotective and refused to let her drive into the desert alone. _

_ He’d been the one to hold her hair out of the way as she lost the little she had eaten into a nearby bush. He took out a blanked and covered up his blistered and burned body. _

_ He held her while they waited for backup, and he was the one to tell the Detective working what was now a murder case how they found Lucifer. _

_ When she came home that night, she found Maze in the kitchen, eating pomegranate seeds. _

_ The bowl ended up shattered against a wall. _

_ After Maze had left - stormed out, threatening violence and pain to whoever had done this - she was left staring at the seeds splattered all over her kitchen floor. She thinks it’s a pity it isn’t all true. He could’ve eaten some of those and be back in just four months. _

_ Then the _ **_I’m a cop, I can keep it together_ ** _ shield shatters, and she sinks the the floor and cries, and she hates him for doing this to her, and she loves him, and why did this have to happen just when she had been ready to tell him that? _

_ If only it could’ve been true. _

+++ +++ +++

At one point, he figures the problem out and, lo and behold, sends a quick _ thank you _ up to whoever sends him the hints. It takes him a while to figure out when he  _ actually  _ died. He’s never been thankful for his eidetic memory, for so much bad cluttering up his mind. But now he comes close, because it shows him when things had stopped making sense.

He had sent Mum away. He had visited Linda, and then called Chloe.

Had had  _ woken up in the desert _ . So he waits to fall asleep again and, checkmate, wakes up  _ there  _ again.

Only this isn’t the Mojave. Glaring up at the falling ash, and then around him at the endless planes of Gehenna, he starts walking. Of all the places to be dumped in, it had to be the one he had no hold over. It had to be this barren wasteland of between  _ nothing  _ and  _ nowhere, _ where souls are send to perish. But he had to get back. He had to get back to the Detective. He had to get back home.

 

-END-

**Author's Note:**

> This is a Contest Entry for Lucifans.TV Fanfic Contest 2018!
> 
> Also, I hope I didn't make you hate me TOO much with that ending?  
> Cheers!


End file.
